I think this is a very important step forward. I congratulate the Senator from South Carolina. who has been a leader on this effort for awhile. He was obviously a leader on immigration reform. and he has backed up his words on immigration reform. in that the first step in effective immigration reform is effective border security. That is true. That is essential. He has backed that up with this amendment which puts the dollars in place to accomplish this. That is a corollary to this whole debate. which is that we do need to significantly overhaul our immigration laws. make them more appropriate to the times and to the situations. But you cannot get the public confidence to do immigration reform unless the American people believe at the outset that our border--especially the southern borderis secure from people being able to cross willynilly into this country illegally. These dollars will put in place the resources necessary to accomplish that. to make sure our southern border is secure on the issue of crossings. It may take a couple years for them to bear fruit because there is not an instant response with the hiring of agents.
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border security immigration